Published 5:30 am, Friday, November 5, 2004

A sixth person in the vehicle was taken to a hospital in Columbus, and that victim's condition was not immediately known, said Tela Mange of the DPS.

The students may have been heading back from school when the car they were in smashed into an 18-wheeler.

The crash was reported shortly before 3:30 p.m., about a mile from Rice Consolidated High School in Altair.

"School had just been dismissed a few minutes before and they were heading home," Rice Consolidated Independent School District Superintendent Michael Lanier said. "The young ladies were from Eagle Lake, and they were heading home in that direction."

Assistant football coach Michael Barnes said the four teens killed were students at Rice Consolidated. He said the accident devastated classmates, and that the team's game against Bellville in Altair was rescheduled for 2 p.m. on Saturday.

"Four of their fellow students just died, so it's pretty hard on them. They were all crying," Barnes said of the players. "We had a meeting and let them all go home."

Authorities were working to determine the cause of the accident and notify victims' next of kin, Mange said.

"We don't know at this point what caused the driver to lose control," she said.

Altair is located in Colorado County just south of Columbus, about 65 miles west of Houston on Interstate 10.

"It is pretty tough," Lanier said. "They are here one minute and gone the next. They hadn't even started living yet."